LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1969, Page 69

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THE DOCTRINAL ESSAY 69

can find flaws in the subscription to the Lutheran Con-
fessions. When we find them, shall we postpone part-
nership? Paul has a good word to the Philippians: “Do
all things without grumbling or questioning, that you
may be blameless and innocent, children of God with-
out blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse
generation, among whom you shine as lights in the
world, holding fast the Word of life, so that in the
day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in
vain or labor in vain.” (Phil. 2:14-16)

Search the Scriptures for the truth of the edifying
Word, yes. But from the debate to prove ourselves
right and the other wrong, from that may the edifying
Word spoken humbly to one another deliver us. And
it’s high time as we display ourselves to a needy world
in the goldfish bowl of the national news services.

A final inhibitor for the partnership in the Gospel
is leapfrogging. By that I mean the tendency to over-
look the job of Christian love that is next door and
within reach, in order to get busy far away. Outstand-
ing leapfroggers were the priest and Levite on the
Jericho road anxious to get from the temple into the
family back home and stay untouched by the man
bleeding to death in their path. Five years ago the
Synod made a huge step forward when it affirmed that
the mission of the church is not accomplished by leap-
frogging over man’s need at home to invest itself in
programs overseas, or vice versa, but that the mission
of the church is one.

So it‘is that we brace ourselves for partnership in
the Gospel not only in these days but back home too.
The edifying Word that moves out from this conven-
tion dies in thin air where any one of us fails to speak
it directly to spouse and children, fellow members and
Christians back home. The progress toward synodical
fellowship, whether you propose to make it official or
not, goes on, and you can’t afford ever to stop it or
to silence it. Least of all do you stop it toward a friend
who says, “You folks accept the Augsburg Confession
too?” and you say, “Yes, it says, ‘For the true unity of
the church it is sufficient that with one accord the
Gospel is preached and the sacraments rightly admin-
istered.’ ”

IV

The Word of God Builds Christian Families
Lesson: LuKE 10:38-42

I am deeply grateful for this privilege of addressing
the representatives of 6,000 congregations of The Lu-
theran Church — Missouri Synod. Probably nowhere
else in the world at this moment is there such a concen-
tration of thought on the meaning of the church and of
the Word of God that has to build it.

At the same time I am talking not just to delegates
of congregations but to representatives of families. Most
of you are spouses and parents. Whatever chain reaction
of sharing the edifying Word can grow out of this con-
vention will take hold first of all in many thousands of
homes. The whole proposal won’t be worth much unless
that is exactly where it takes hold first.

A

The church is the gathering of members of the body
of Christ, and it is everywhere where God’s people are
bringing the edifying Word to bear upon one another.
The simplest and primary cell for this operation is the
Christian family. St. Paul called the union of the Chris-
tian husband and wife a mystery, the unfolding of God’s
redeeming love in His Son, the church (Eph. 5:32).
Repeatedly he conveyed greetings to a “church in the
house” (e. g, Col. 4:15), a group of Christians in a
household of whom he knew that they supported each
other’s faith and life by the Gospel of God. He had him-
self experienced it in the home of Aquila and Priscilla,
who not only gave him employment as a traveling tent-
maker in Ephesus or Corinth, but protection and stimu-
lus for his faith and courage (Acts 18:2, 26; Rom. 16:3-
4). That is what the people of God in our households
are to be too.

It’s difficult to make recommendations for the family
in our day without sounding preachy. The old story
from the Bible which we heard before this address is
apt to sound like little more than a pretext for recom-
mending family devotions before and not just after
dinner. Youngsters and parents alike are apt to regard
such advice as impossible to carry out. For home is
where you get ready to go somewhere else. Home is
where young mothers get stir crazy while the babies
are tiny, where husbands leave for bowling to get re-
freshed for the next day’s labors, where children grad-
ually become too busy to help with the household chores
and finally intolerant of the attitude of the elders who
can’t understand the young. As I talk, I sound like part
of the conspiracy to keep the family boat from rocking
and to make youngsters behave comfortably toward
their parents.

But let’s admit it at once that the great households
which the Bible holds before us were places where
chores got done. Our Lord didn’t complain about Mar-
tha’s chores; what He said was, “Of the many things
that are needful, one is most.” He wasn’t downgrading
the chores but sorting out the priorities. At a time that
seems so trying for the family and the maintaining of re-
ligious values in the family, how can we find it possible
to keep a priority for the edifying Word, the remem-
brance of the redeeming work of Jesus Christ? As we
try to answer that question, we shall get some help
for doing this also in all the other situations of church
life, its worship and education.

B

Let’s start with the hardest question: What converts
a household and a family into the church in that house?
Is it simply that people take time out to read the Bible
to each other and worship God? Isn’t it true that such
practices can become hurried and perfunctory, that
youngsters can gain a lasting aversion to such disciplines
and carry them over into demands of church and Sun-
day school which they find irksome?

Perhaps so. But remember what a family is all
about; remember the one thing that makes it funda-